


Come And Get Me Today

by m_steelgrave



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU after OotP, Auror Draco Malfoy, Auror Ginny Weasley, Auror Harry Potter, Aurors, Harry With Vices, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Probably Way Too Much Like a Muggle Cop Show but I Don't Care, Wandless Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 20:40:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5389505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_steelgrave/pseuds/m_steelgrave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Draco comes to work at the Ministry. Harry smokes like a chimney and makes things explode. Ginny meddles with good intentions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come And Get Me Today

**Author's Note:**

> Written after OOtP came out in a fit of Harry/Draco Auror madness. Most definitely not canon-compliant at this point. So I suppose that makes it AU.
> 
> Title taken from "Late Nights and Street Fights" by Dirty Vegas.
> 
> Originally published on my LJ/Website sometime in 2005 under the title _Rearranging_. I sucked at titles then, and I do now, but this one sucks a little less.

**One.**

It was a Thursday. Draco Malfoy walked into the Ministry of Magic carrying a cardboard box of his belongings. Stepping out of the lift on the second floor, he regarded the Department of Magical Law Enforcement with an expression on his face that said he would prefer to be anywhere but there.  
His entrance did not go unremarked by the other Ministry employees. They turned to watch him walk deliberately, head held high and trademark sneer firmly in place, to the nearest empty desk. Whispers began immediately and did not cease. 

Ginny Weasley chewed the end of her quill and watched Malfoy organize files into drawers and place his quill and inkwell just so. She got the impression that Malfoy's life was in that box, despite the fact that he withdrew no items of a personal nature from it. No photographs, no letters, no knick-knacks. In fact, the only thing he pulled out of the box that wasn't an office supply was a dull silver badge that he rubbed with his thumb for a moment before tossing it far back into the top drawer. Ginny recognized it as Malfoy's Head Boy badge. 

The whispers from the surrounding workers were by now louder, and Ginny caught phrases that varied from, "Goodness, isn't he looking good these days," to, "What is he doing here? Isn't he a Death Eater?" 

Malfoy must have heard them, too. He set his jaw and, as though unpacking his life from a cardboard box was the most strenuous of tasks, rolled up his sleeves. The absence of the expected Dark Mark caused the whispers to multiply. Malfoy looked both tired and murderous. He pulled the last item from the box—a brass nameplate that read in tight calligraphy "Draco Malfoy, Auror, Special Services"—and set it at the front of his desk. The noise made everyone in the room jump. With a final glare, Malfoy stalked into the staff room. 

Ginny raised an eyebrow. Across the room and sprawled at his desk as usual, Harry Potter did the same. He pulled his feet off his desk and set down his quill, his interest no longer held by the parchment he had nearly covered with tic-tac-toe hatches. It seemed odd to Ginny that Harry didn't get up and march into the staff room to give Malfoy merry hell. It seemed odder still that Harry made little response at all to Malfoy's presence, but then Ginny had long ago given up trying to understand Harry's reactions to some things. She shrugged at him and followed Malfoy into the staff room herself, with the intention of ignoring him entirely. 

He was standing at the windows—enchanted to display an overcast sky on that particular day—one hand on his hip, the other pinching the bridge of his nose as if to ward off a headache. Ginny pulled a pizza box out of the refrigerator (donated by the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Department, on account of the appliance's penchant for devouring the food stored inside it). Sitting at the table, she munched on her cold pizza and watched Malfoy with vague interest. 

He turned to leave, but stopped upon seeing Ginny. 

"What?" said Ginny, mouth full and enjoying the disdain it caused on Malfoy's face. 

"My God, Weasley. How can you eat that?" he asked. It was certainly milder than the insults Ginny had been expecting. 

"It involves a lot of chewing," she said. Malfoy scowled at her, and she grinned before taking another bite. 

"You could at least heat it up a bit." 

"I could, yes," said Ginny, licking crumbs from her fingers. "But then I'd get called over to someone's desk to take care of something, or to Susan Bones's office, or to some other really important mission. I'd set this down and forget about it, and by the time I found it again, it would be cold, anyway. So I figure I'll save myself some time and effort and just eat it like this from the start." 

Malfoy's eyebrows were raised in an expression of mild amusement at the logic behind Ginny's abhorrent lunch habits. She wasn't certain, but it looked like he might even smile. Curiouser and curiouser, thought Ginny. Aloud she said, "They don't like you much out there, do they?" 

The amusement vanished from Malfoy's face. "I didn't come here to be liked," he said quietly. 

"Mission accomplished," said Ginny cheerfully. She selected another piece of pizza and proceeded to peel the pepperoni off one by one.

Malfoy smirked. "You've spent too much time around your brother." 

"Which? I have six, you know." 

"Heavens," said Malfoy with mock concern. "How could I forget?" 

Ginny shrugged and chewed another pepperoni. "It's a challenge. Odds are I'll turn out just as pigheaded as they are, but I pride myself on the fact that I'm not. Pigheaded, that is." 

"Please," Malfoy snorted, "the Weasley stubborn streak comes with the hair. All that changes is what you're stubborn about." 

"Not untrue," conceded Ginny. Watching him over the top of the pizza box, she said, "So I know you said you're not here to be liked, which I think is a big fat lie, by the way, but why are you here?" 

"Apparently my work as a spy has made me too valuable to the Ministry for them to let me out of their sight. So it's desk duty for me," Malfoy said dryly. He sighed and added, "It involves a lot of chewing." 

Ginny chuckled and popped another pepperoni in her mouth. Malfoy rolled his eyes. 

"I can hardly stand to watch you eat that. I'll gladly buy you lunch if you'll just stop eating that monstrosity." 

"I like to think I'm putting it out of its misery," she said. "Are you next in line?" 

"That wasn't terribly funny," said Malfoy. "You'll notice I didn't laugh." 

"Wouldn't be much of a change, now would it?" 

Malfoy rolled his eyes once more. "Oh, for God's sake, just come on." He dragged her bodily from the room, depositing the empty pizza box in the waste bin with more enthusiasm than Ginny felt was necessary. 

Once out in the office again, all eyes were on the two of them. Harry wandered by as Ginny fetched her coat from her desk chair. Glancing in Malfoy's direction he asked, "What's this, then?" 

"Malfoy's taking me to lunch," said Ginny casually. Harry's jaw nearly dropped in surprise. 

"Malfoy's—" 

"—taking me to lunch, yes," Ginny repeated. "Something about cold pizza being culinary blasphemy. I think he's trying to reform me." She shrugged again, an action she felt would be repeated quite a bit as far as the new addition to the Auror team was concerned, and followed Malfoy out of the room. 

 

**Two.**

Ginny enjoyed the benefits of having Harry Potter as a friend not because he was Harry Potter, but because he was a good friend. The two of them went out to lunch and dinner several times a week, enjoying the simplicity of each other's company after a long day at the Ministry. Sometimes it was nice, Ginny thought, to spend time with someone who knew everything about you, but didn't make a big deal out of it. 

She and Draco had grown close, as well, for reasons of which even Ginny was unsure. She found it endearing that they could get together and laugh and have a fantastic time, but Draco was the only person, other than her mother, who called her Ginevra. She supposed it was his way of continuing to needle her out of habit—he knew she hated her name—but at some point, she had begun to think of it as a term of affection. He did not inform her otherwise. 

Sometimes it was nice to spend time with someone who didn't know much about her at all, too. 

Ginny realized how strange it was that of all people in the world, the two she would consider her closest friends were also supposed to be archrivals. The rest of the Ministry watched silently as she would walk out with one or the other of her friends, though Ginny knew their exit was always followed by whispered conjecture. 

They all feared Harry, if just a little. And they were suspicious of Draco, no matter how many times he proved himself. These attitudes made Ginny even less likely to discuss her personal life with the rest of her coworkers. 

"I don't see how you can put up with that pretentious git," Katie Bell said once of Ginny's dinner dates with Draco. "He must be up to something. Don't trust him, Gin." 

"Of course he's up to something," said Ginny sweetly, "I hear you're next in line. Quidditch grudge." 

Katie swallowed visibly. At his desk, Draco smirked. "That was a very Slytherin thing to do, Ginevra," he said as she walked by. 

"Thank you," said Ginny. Incidents like that were not unusual, as Ginny found herself defending her friends more often than she would have liked. The odd thing was that she never had to defend them to one another. They would sometimes scowl at the mention of the other's name, but that was really the extent of their open dislike. They even managed to make it through entire missions without killing each other. Ginny went to great lengths to spend as much time with one and she did with the other, though, just in case. She felt like a child in a very civil custody battle.

This precarious balance was something for which Ginny was immensely grateful, which is why she panicked slightly when Draco asked her to come over for dinner one Monday night. Monday nights were Harry nights. 

"I would, Draco, but I've already made plans with Harry," she said carefully, hoping Draco would appreciate her honesty. 

"Oh," said Draco. "Right." 

Ginny was surprised and immediately suspicious when the scowl and muttering she expected did not come. She knew he was disappointed and trying to mask it, certainly, but she did not anticipate the brief look of regret that crossed his face. 

"I don't have anything planned tomorrow," she said, "I'll write you in my planner. In ink." 

"That's fine," said Draco, obviously attempting to change the subject. He waved his hand at her, evidently dismissing her, and bent his head over the files on his desk. 

With an exasperated sigh, Ginny said, "Can we talk about this?" 

Draco's quill paused in its movements. "What's there to talk about? You have plans tonight," he said, "so we'll do something tomorrow. That's fine." 

"I don't mean our plans, you dolt, I mean us. You," said Ginny. 

"I'm sure you don't want to get mired in that particular subject," Draco said, his tone cool, "you should go get ready to go out with Harry." He smirked at her the way he used to do in school, but Ginny saw past it to the slight envy that was there. 

So that's what the problem was, Ginny thought. Draco was jealous. She was genuinely flattered that Draco would feel that way about her, but that did not give him the right to act like a git when something was bothering him. Approaching the subject head-on would not be the best tactic, she knew, so she decided to take the angle of concern. 

"Look," said Ginny, "I'm your friend, Draco. It's my job to be bothered by the fact that you just don't seem very happy sometimes." 

"I don't seem happy?" Draco lingered on the word as if it were completely foreign to him. "What gives you that idea?" 

It was Ginny's turn to smirk. "Well, you're sulking, for one." 

Draco looked genuinely affronted. "I do not sulk." 

"Could have fooled me," said Ginny. "Seriously, though, what's wrong?" 

"Nothing." 

"Liars go to hell," she joked. 

"Really, Ginevra," he said dryly, "I've had my reservation for quite a while. At this point I'm just being thorough." 

"Is it Harry?" Ginny said, ignoring him. "Because you know we're friends, and I can't not spend time with him just because of some enormously stupid juvenile grudge between the two of you." 

"Please. Working," Draco referenced the various stacks of files and parchment that surrounded him without lifting his eyes from his desk. This finally succeeded in irritating Ginny to the point that she threw her hands in the air. If Draco was going to act like this, she refused to talk to him. 

"You are so insufferable sometimes," she growled. Then, not caring about being delicate anymore, she added, "You're just jealous, is all," and turned to leave. 

Draco's response was quiet. "And what if I were?" 

"Oh," said Ginny irritably, turning on him and preparing to rebuke him thoroughly, and then, " _Oh._ " 

Draco was staring across the room, where Harry was sitting with his feet propped on his desk, chewing thoughtfully on the end of his quill, no doubt playing tic-tac-toe with himself as he always did. 

And Ginny thought back to their days at Hogwarts, when Harry and Draco would always watch each other from the house tables in the Great Hall, and how Draco would pass snide notes to Harry that were folded with so much care. She thought of how Draco never mentioned Harry around her, and how he always avoided the opposite end of the Ministry offices when Harry was at his desk. How, when the two of them were paired on an assignment, Draco would get the job done as quickly as possible, as if being in the same room with Harry was simply unbearable. 

And it occurred to Ginny that perhaps she was not the object of Draco's jealousy, after all. 

"Draco..." she began, knowing that her realization had come into her voice. 

Draco looked up at her, suddenly aware of the change in her tone. "Don't," he said. 

Don't what? thought Ginny. Don't pity me, don't say anything to Harry, don't say anything to me because it would hurt too much to hear it voiced? 

Aloud, she said softly, "Okay." Draco made no response. 

Back at her desk, Ginny circled her temples with her fingers and muttered, "Stupid, Ginevra. Very, very stupid." How on earth had she missed something that now appeared so painfully obvious? And had she just managed to make things incredibly awkward for all three of them? In the space of a half-hour, she had gone from having two good but rather distant friends, to being irritated that she was an unwilling part of a love triangle, to realizing that there was no triangle at all and that one of her friends had been pining for the other for a frankly silly length of time. Ginny wasn't sure she could keep up with it all, and not step on the fragile male ego that she'd managed to surround herself with. 

"Boys," she said to herself, as if it were a word her mother would have swatted at her with a spoon for using.

A hand on her shoulder made her jump. She turned to find Draco standing behind her. "We're still on for tomorrow, aren't we?" he said with a small smile, "Because I was under the impression that you'd written it down in ink, and you can't go breaking an engagement written in ink." 

Ginny smiled, relief making her a bit shaky. "Of course. If you'll consent to be seen in public with me." 

"Seeing as my reputation's already shot to hell, being seen with you shouldn't do much more harm," he said. "And as long as you don't meddle." He gave her a meaningful look. 

"Meddle?" said Ginny. "Who's meddling?" 

"Good. Now go have dinner with Harry." Leaning down, he whispered in her ear, "And promise to tell me all about it?" 

Ginny squeezed Draco's hand where it still lingered on her shoulder. "Only if you want me to," she said. Draco smiled. As he walked away, she added under her breath, "And only until I fix it so you're there firsthand." 

She smiled to herself. Sometimes it was nice to spend time with friends who would have no idea what hit them, too. 

 

**Three.**

In the wee hours of Tuesday morning, Albus Dumbledore fell in a battle at Hogsmeade. He was protecting a group of Hogwarts students. 

On Tuesday afternoon, Harry Potter received an owl at his office in the Ministry. 

The Ministry organized a funeral march through the streets of Wizarding London on Thursday afternoon. 

Friday morning, twenty-four Death Eaters were found dead in Little Hangleton and there was no trace of Harry Potter. 

The news of Dumbledore's death and the sudden messy demise of two dozen Death Eaters was soon followed by speculation concerning the mental stability of the Boy Who Lived. This was nothing new; in slow times during the Second War the Daily Prophet frequently turned to examination of Harry Potter's sanity, or supposed lack thereof. 

The headlines made Draco grimace. Tasteless garbage. The accompanying photograph featured a sullen Harry growling at the camera around a cigarette. It was a shame Creevey got himself killed, Draco mused. The Prophet had actually been palatable for the short time he had worked there. Draco ripped the posted article off the wall outside the tavern, balled it up and tossed it behind him into the dingy roadside snow. 

Draco couldn't remember the last time it had been as cold as it was that night. But he had gotten a note from Ginevra, asking him to meet her there for dinner. He was suspicious because it was Monday, and Draco knew she usually reserved Mondays for Harry. Harry was nowhere to be found, however, so Draco went to meet her at the pub anyway. 

Draco realized his earlier suspicions had been founded, however, when Potter himself came weaving out of the pub within the next five minutes, leaving a meandering line of tracks in the snow. 

"Potter?" Draco straightened and did his best to ignore the fact that his knees had gone to liquid the moment Potter staggered into sight. Potter turned and cast him a muzzy glare over his shoulder. 

"Why are you here, Malfoy?" he asked flatly. 

Draco shrugged, trying to seem affable. "I'm supposed to meet Ginevra here for dinner." 

Harry squinted at him. "So am I," he said. "How odd." 

It wasn't one bit odd, Draco thought. Cunning as a Slytherin, that Ginevra Weasley. She knew very well that she was making dinner plans with both of them at the same time. Scowling and plotting ways of enacting his revenge on her, he pulled the collar of his overcoat up higher against the wind and cursed the fact that on the coldest evening in memory he had to stand outside a hole-in-the-wall pub and try not to make a fool of himself in front of Harry Potter. 

Conversation, he thought. Strike up a conversation. Grasping for things to say, he settled on, "There's a rumor going around that you've gone barking mad." The moment the words left his mouth, Draco winced. He wondered when he had lost all vestiges of tact. 

Potter looked vaguely amused. He pulled a cigarette out of his pocket that sparked to life seemingly of its own will. "It wouldn't be the first time that one's made the rounds, as I'm sure you well remember." 

"Seems I recall reading something to that effect any number of times." 

"Don't believe everything you read, Malfoy." He tipped his chin to indicate that Draco should walk with him, so Draco shoved his hands deep into his pockets and matched Potter's stride. 

"Every rumor has a grain of truth to it, Potter," he pointed out. "And it would seem that the sheer number of times the Daily Prophet has proclaimed you certifiable would lend the statement credence." 

Potter laughed once, an echo in the alley and a cloud of smoke in the cold air. "I can still tell a hawk from a handsaw." 

Draco fixed him with an appraising grey eye. "Can you?" 

Potter grinned. "Why are you here?" he repeated his earlier inquiry. Draco shrugged again. 

"The Ministry's still in an uproar over Dumbledore's death," he said, growing serious, "but every Auror they can spare is out looking for you." It was no lie. Draco had been out with a search team earlier, but had taken time off to meet Ginevra. It was a good thing he had. 

Draco's urgent tone had no visible effect on Potter. "And why are they all looking for me, do you suppose?" he mused, kicking a clod of snow across the street. 

"I'd guess it has something to do with the two dozen Death Eaters who turned up dead in Little Hangleton a week ago," said Draco. He watched Potter's reaction intently, noting that Potter was himself aware of Draco's scrutiny. He took a long, slow drag on his cigarette, face unreadable. 

"Dead? Two dozen of them? Really?" 

"They weren't just dead, Potter. They were pretty much unrecognizable, from what I saw." 

Potter paused. Quietly, he said, "Did you know your father?" 

For a moment the two men watched one another without a word. Finally Draco answered, "Yes." 

Potter looked thoughtful. He dropped the cigarette butt to the ground and crushed it beneath one booted foot. "I'm glad. For what it's worth." 

Draco snorted, though he felt distantly flattered. "I knew him well enough to turn him over to my mother and leave before the funeral. That was the last allegiance I ever need pay to him." 

"What about Fudge?" Potter began walking again, and Draco followed suit. 

"The Ministry feels…well, Fudge thinks...oh, fuck it," Draco swore, unable to think of a delicate way to phrase what he was about to say. "Our orders were to stun you on sight. Fudge thinks you're a danger to the wizarding community." 

Green eyes seemed to glow in the dark. "And what do you think?" 

"I told him he's an ungrateful idiot and walked out." 

Again, Potter looked as if there was much more running through his head than he was letting on. "Dumbledore had to pull strings to get you that Auror position." 

"Not that I'm not thankful. And they'll have me back, of course. I know too much for them to just let me walk out like that. I doubt Fudge will be inviting me to tea, though, after the scene I made," said Draco. 

"Thanks, I think," said Potter with a grin. Draco was beginning to pick up on the fact that the wobbly grin that appeared on Potter's face was not involuntary. Sobering for a moment, he said, "It was your father I found and asked to take me to Voldemort. We ended up in Little Hangleton, but of course Voldemort wasn't there. It was just a bunch of his lackeys," Potter spat the word as if it offended his very soul. "I don't really remember much after that." 

Draco sighed, exasperated. "Come tell what you do remember to the Ministry, then." 

Potter didn't budge. "Why does the Ministry want to question me?" 

"It seems to me, and I'm sure Lucius's former contingency would agree, that you'd have more motive than anyone to kill those men." 

Potter paused, looking at Draco as if he had just questioned something as indisputable as the sky being blue. 

"Those men were Death Eaters," he said simply. 

"I know." 

"Then why does the Ministry want to bring me in as if I'd murdered two dozen innocent people?" 

Draco sighed. Things were not going well. "You vanished. They're concerned about you. It's just procedure, Potter." 

"Procedure?" Potter was obviously having difficulty digesting this information, though whether it was a result of the alcohol or his amazement at the sheer stupidity of the Ministry, it was hard to tell. 

"Yes," explained Draco as casually as possible. Potter looked murderous. "They'll ask a few questions, get a statement, fiddle with your wand a bit." 

Potter thrust his wand at Draco. "Here. You can Priori Incantatem 'til your teeth fall out, it won't tell you a damned thing." 

Draco stared at the proffered wand, then at Harry. The pieces suddenly came together in Draco's mind. "Wandless magic," he said at last. 

"Untraceable." 

"That's right." 

"You did all that without a wand? Fucking hell, Potter!" 

"That's why I can't remember much. I was exhausted. What?" Potter asked, not understanding why his actions had so shocked Draco. "They were shit, Malfoy, and you of all people should know that as well as I do." 

"I don't care what they were!" Draco shouted. Potter was being unnecessarily dense, and it was tiring. "We've twenty-four dead men, or various and sundry parts of them, at least. Questions have to be answered." 

"Why all the bloody questions?" demanded Potter. 

"Those people exploded, Harry." Draco was watching him differently now, and he could tell it made Potter a little uncomfortable. That was good. 

"Oh," said Potter awkwardly before turning away. His hands were shaking, Draco noticed. "Well, then." 

Draco took Potter's momentary silence as an opportunity to collect his thoughts. "Wandless magic," he mumbled to himself, talking himself through the facts as he paced in the slush. "Okay, that's good. Lucius's followers can't use this to throw you to the Dementors. The part of the Ministry that's not been corrupted won't stand for it if there's no evidence." 

"When did your father become 'Lucius?'" Potter asked suddenly, looking up from where he had fished another cigarette out of his shirt pocket. Draco glanced at him briefly, debating his answer. 

"When he threw me out." 

"Why did he throw you out?" 

"So, if you come in and answer some questions as soon as possible," Draco ignored Potter's second question, returning to the subject of keeping him from being fed to the Dementors by corrupt Ministry officials, "we can start citing the lack of evidence almost immediately." 

"Oh, come off it," Potter said, stalking closer to Draco. "I'll bet Fudge is secretly getting his rocks off at the thought of having two dozen fewer Death Eaters to worry about sneaking up behind him." 

"One, that was certainly a visual I didn't need," sniffed Draco. "And two, it's beside the point. In case you haven't noticed, there are rules to this game we're playing at." 

Potter suddenly looked very sober and very dangerous. "Who's playing?" he asked, voice low. "This isn't a game, Malfoy, it's a war." 

"You don't have to tell me that. The rules are there to keep you alive," Draco hissed through his teeth. Why didn't Harry understand? "There's a big difference between running around school after hours and gallivanting off to ambush two dozen Death Eaters by yourself. You should have owled for backup. You could have been killed." 

"I'm aware of the consequences, Malfoy." 

At this Draco finally lost his ironclad temper. "All the more reason for you to follow procedure, Potter!" 

Harry exploded. "To hell with your fucking procedure! That's all it's ever about with you, isn't it?" he demanded. "Your bloody procedure, your protocol. Tuck your shirt in, ride your broom sidesaddle, stick your pinky out, sip, never gulp. Always got to be in control. That's your problem, Malfoy. Control." 

Draco punched Harry hard enough to make him spin. He watched, trying his damndest not to be livid, as the other man took a deep breath to steady himself. 

"Better?" Draco drawled, shaking the creaks out of his knuckles. He noted grimly that they were going to hurt later. 

Harry adjusted his jaw before grinning. There was blood on his lip. "No. If you weren't such a reserved bastard, you'd have hit me more than once." 

"Don't push your luck, Potter. You're drunk." 

"Twenty points to Slytherin for that keen observation," said Harry. Then, glancing down at the slushy puddle in which his cigarette had landed, "Shit, shit, fuck and bugger. That was my last one." 

He plucked it from the wet and dangled it from two fingers, studying it mournfully. Draco wrinkled his nose. "Those things are going to kill you." 

"So's Voldemort, but I don't get grumpy if I don't see him every half hour." The thought crossed Draco's mind that Harry's shaking hands were not the result of a need for a nicotine fix. Harry made a vague gesture at the cigarette and it stopped dripping and caught fire once again. 

"Stop that," said Draco. 

Harry rolled his eyes and replaced the cigarette in the corner of his mouth. "I already told you, I am very much aware of how filthy this particular vice is. I don't need you playing mother." 

"Not the fag," Draco snapped, "the wandless magic. You've no way to control it, especially when you're drunk, and we already know what you're capable of. I don't want you to try to light that bloody thing and end up setting me aflame instead." 

"Would it really be so bad, me setting you aflame?" Harry waggled an eyebrow, albeit a rather muzzy motion, and Draco could not help but laugh. 

"Absolutely terrifying. It's my most deep-seated fear, aside from Muggle appliances and small confined spaces." 

Harry laughed so hard he stumbled, and Draco had to catch his elbow to steady him. It was the first time he had seen Harry laugh—let go and truly laugh—in months, years maybe. Not that he was one to judge, having mastered the art of suppressing his emotions at a very young age, but in a way he had always thrived on the emotions of others. Watching Harry over the past few months, watching him turn everything inward, had given Draco a vague worry like that of knowing something has gone missing without being able to name it. 

It occurred to Draco that Harry had not been that boy—the too-skinny boy that made the brilliant suicide dive for Longbottom's remembrall their first year—for some time. Harry did those things out of kindness and a sense that right should always overcome wrong. That kindness was gone now, and Draco held the secret belief that it might never return if the world didn't stop expecting Harry to perform one miracle after another. Harry would always do his duty, what was expected of him. He would stand up for the little guy, fight injustice and eventually take on Voldemort for the last time, but Draco doubted if he believed in any of it anymore. 

"I never thought I'd say this," said Harry when he caught his breath, "but you're not half bad, Malfoy." 

Draco sniffed, hiding a smile. "Of course I am. I don't have any illusions anymore, Potter. I'm a right bastard and you've a foul temper. That's why we get on so well." 

"Do we, then?" The question was masked by Harry's chiding tone, but Draco knew it for what it was. He paused, unsure of how to respond. He looked down at the dingy slush that lapped at his boots, then at Harry's cigarette, now reduced to a precarious length of ash balanced between his fingers. 

"There's no reason why we shouldn't anymore," he conceded. When he glanced back up, he found Harry studying him. 

"Why are you so hellbent on getting my name cleared with the Ministry? Ginny put you up to it?" 

Draco gave him an enigmatic smile. "Yes and no. Mostly because I've laid all bets on you," he said easily, "and Malfoys do not lose." 

The ire Draco was expecting did not come. Harry's tone was curious, even accepting. "Is that what it's about to you? Winning?" 

"Not about winning, no." Draco's smile waned somewhat. "It's about not losing. There's a difference." He meant any number of things, really; the war, the game, control, faith, himself...and Harry. The other man was still watching him with that candid curiosity that made Draco want to open up and tell him every secret he'd ever kept. 

"Is this where you remind me that the fate of the entire world rests on my shoulders?" Harry asked. More than a little fatigue crept into his chuckle. 

"Please," said Draco with the characteristic sneer that was still famous at Hogwarts, "the saving the world bit is overdone. I'd settle for something more manageable, like proving Lucius—my father," he corrected himself, —wrong." 

"Well, he's certainly not around to argue his point anymore," Harry muttered. He looked distinctly uncomfortable. 

Draco dropped the affected tone and shrugged. "Mission accomplished, then," he said affably. "You've held up your end of the deal. I don't expect anything more." 

"I thought Slytherins were supposed to be ambitious," said Harry. 

"Ambitious, yes. Stupid, no. My first goal these days is to survive, and my second goal is to do it long enough to come up with a third." Draco didn't feel the need to mention that goal number three was to run a hand through Harry's unkept hair to confirm his theory that it was as soft as it looked.  
Harry nodded. Of all of them, he understood what it meant to want to come out of all this alive, to hope for nothing more, and expect something less.  
Suspicion and the alcohol made him squint at Draco. "And what's your end of the bargain?" 

"I suppose that's up to you." Draco said, the words not hanging as lightly in the air as he had hoped they would. He suddenly remembered exactly who it was he was talking to, and all the less than cordial incidents of their past together. Part of him wanted to kick himself for making such an open offer, but the rest of him was remarkably not terrified, despite the slightly unnerving way Harry looked him over. 

"Well," Harry declared, "you can walk me home." 

Draco raised an eyebrow. "What?" 

"You can walk me home to fulfill your end of the bargain. Unless you don't want to, but I really think if I tried to hail a cab right now it might catch fire." Harry started to demonstrate hailing a cab, but Draco caught his arm and put it back down at his side. 

"No, that's fine," he said hastily. "I wasn't just going to leave you to your own muddled devices, anyway." He scowled. Harry grinned. "If I walk you home," Draco said, giving Harry a small shove to get him walking again, "will you come back to the office tomorrow and talk to Shacklebolt, at least?" 

Harry nodded slowly, dropping his spent cigarette into the gutter. "On my own terms," he said. "I'm going to talk to him about you, too." 

"Me?" said Draco. 

"You. They're treating you like shit and it's fucking ridiculous," Harry said fervently. "If they didn't keep such a tight hold on you, you'd be a better Auror. Not that you're not a good one, mind." 

"Fair enough," said Draco. In truth, he was more than a little stunned at Harry's oath. "It's the least we can do for each other, I suppose. Keep each other from getting screwed over." 

"Sounds like we have a plan, Malfoy," said Harry. "Ginny will be overjoyed. She's been trying to make us get along for months. Years, really." 

"So she's been pestering you, too? I thought that was a special privilege reserved only for me." Draco smirked. "You know what we have to do now." 

"Make her sorry she ever suggested it?" Harry ventured. 

"Couldn't have put it better myself, Potter." 

They smiled. 

 

 **Four.**

He learned to smoke from Sirius. It was one of those unusually clear nights that clustered around the start of the year, when Harry was staying at Grimmauld Place for Christmas. His head full of worries and serpentine dreams not of his own mind's design, Harry wandered up to the attic and discovered his godfather perched in one of the narrow windows, pulling a cigarette from his lips. 

Wizards smoked pipes, but Harry thought cigarettes were a Muggle invention. 

"They are," said Sirius. He exhaled and the smoke looked briefly as if it took the shape of a dog. Harry wondered if Sirius was doing it on purpose. "I picked it up from your mum, actually. I'd do anything to push Mother's buttons." 

"Did it work?" Harry guessed it did, knowing the portrait Mrs. Black's reaction to anything Muggle. 

Sirius snorted. "Irritated her worse than a bat up her nightdress. That I would pick up a filthy Muggle habit like smoking pissed her right off." He jammed the butt of the cigarette against the windowsill, then tossed it into a tarnished silver soup tureen. Sirius must have fought Kreacher for it; the house-elf was rabid about caching the family heirlooms away from Muggle-loving paws. 

Harry smiled at this, but it was a hollow smile. 

"What's wrong?" Sirius asked, pulling two more fags from the pack. Harry raised an eyebrow at this, and after only a second's hesitation he plucked the proffered cigarette from Sirius's hand. 

"I just feel helpless," he said. "Everyone knows so much more about what's going on than I do. I hate being helpless. It's exhausting." 

"I think I know what you mean," said Sirius. Harry colored. Sirius was even more bound by the outside world than he was. At least Harry had his freedom. 

"Sorry," he said. Sirius threw a too-thin arm around his shoulders. 

"Lean in here," he said, producing his wand to light their cigarettes. 

"Careful. Take it easy or you'll cough and wake Molly. She'd have a fit if she knew I'm corrupting you." 

Harry smiled at the thought of Mrs. Weasley catching them, as if they were sneaking an illicit smoke in the school bathroom. 

"Sirius?" he asked after the burning in this throat from the first drag subsided, "Why are you still smoking if your mum's—" 

"Does she sound dead?" 

Harry thought of the painting's murderous screeches and grimaced. "No." 

"Exactly. If I can't get her off that wall, she'll have to deal with me sneaking a cig every once and again." 

There was another amiable pause between them, and Harry's mind had finally wandered to more pleasant topics when Sirius spoke again. "And if I'm going to go," he said firmly, "it's going to be on my terms. They're my damned cigarettes. They can't take that from me." He took another drag with relish. 

Harry thought of basilisks, graveyards and the nightmare snake, and of the walls behind Dumbledore's eyes. 

He lifted his cigarette to his lips and inhaled. 

 

 **Five.**

Ginny Weasley watched Draco Malfoy pace by her desk once more and added another tally mark to the growing flock of them on her napkin. She didn't really have to look up from her work to watch him. She could recognize his steps as they drew closer, moody and staccato. If she missed hearing his approach, she caught snatches of gruff conversation he had with their coworkers. Most everyone in the Ministry knew to avoid Draco when he was pacing. As with anyone, it meant he had something weighing on his mind. Unlike everyone else, though, what weighed on Draco's mind was usually a much larger albatross than anything the rest of them had to deal with. 

He drew near her desk for the thirtieth time that day. Ginny made a diagonal mark on her napkin as she listened to him snap at Percy's secretary for not meeting Ministry dress code. The girl cringed. Ginny took that as her cue to give up her tallying and intercept Draco's path before he could frighten too many more people. 

He saw her heading his way and stopped, prepared to chastise her for something as he had just done with the secretary, but Ginny grabbed his elbow and ordered, "Lounge. Now." He looked for a moment as if he wanted to argue, but his mouth snapped shut and he allowed her to drag him to the staff room. 

Ginny poured two cups of scorched coffee and set one on the table for Draco wordlessly. He ignored it, choosing instead to stare sullenly out the window, which was charmed to display full sun that day. 

She conjured two spoons of sugar into her coffee. "Draco, this has got to stop." 

"I'll thank you to stay out of my business, Ginevra," he said. Ginny sighed into her styrofoam cup. At least he wasn't so tightly wound that he called her Weasley. 

"You're frightening the secretaries," she pointed out. "We've had three quit in the last month." 

"It's not my fault they're incompetent. We cannot afford to hire such skittish idiots right now, anyway." Draco had a point. If they could hardly suffer his wrath, how would they react to Voldemort? 

"Fine," said Ginny. "But that doesn't mean you can go around in a foul temper scaring them to death." 

"I'm not in a foul temper," Draco snapped. Ginny raised an eyebrow, and he grabbed his coffee with a grimace. 

"All I'm saying," said Ginny as gently as possible, "is that I'm worried about him, too. We all are. But you don't see us taking it out on each other. If we did, there'd be no one left for him to come home to." 

Draco sipped his coffee at the window, his back to her. He never seemed to fully relax, not since they were in school. There was always some part of him tensed to the breaking point. But then, they all felt that way, thought Ginny. There were times when Harry was gone on a mission for the Order that Ginny simply didn't sleep for days at a time. She would touch up her eyeliner in the Ministry bathroom before her coworkers returned from equally restless nights at home, and after a while she would look in the mirror and wonder where the makeup ended and the fatigue began. 

Everyone but Ginny found it odd that of all of them, Draco was the one who was least effective at hiding the stress of waiting for Harry Potter to come home. Perhaps because the three of them were on the fringes of the Auror group for one reason or another, they understood things differently, if not better. 

"It's been eating away at you for years now. Both of you." 

Draco paused in nursing his coffee. "It doesn't matter." 

"You've got a chance to lay it to rest," said Ginny. She walked over to Draco, still clutching her empty coffee cup, and laid a hand on his shoulder. He swallowed. 

"I can't." 

"You have the courage to do this job every day. Have the courage to tell him what it is you have to say." 

"I'll think about it." He drained the last of his coffee and set the cup on the windowsill, still not looking at her. Ginny nodded silently and turned to leave him alone with his thoughts. 

"The thing is," he said suddenly, so suddenly it startled her, "I'm not worried about what Voldemort might do to him. He can get angry at Voldemort. He can fight him. I can fight him." He was half-turned so his profile was slightly fuzzy because of the glare from the window. "I could die fighting Voldemort today, and know I've done everything I can to protect him. But I know what Harry's capable of. And that's what scares him most, and that's what scares me most. That he'll do something he can never forgive himself for doing. And I can't protect him against that." 

"Maybe," Ginny said, her hand on the doorknob, "you should stop trying to protect him, and start having a little faith in him. And in yourself." 

"People already have too much faith in him," Draco growled. "It's dragging him down. He can't hope to fight Voldemort like that." 

"Maybe it's not dragging him down when it comes from you. Maybe it's grounding him. He can fight it if you're there with him." 

Draco seemed to consider this a moment before adding crossly, "Well, it doesn't help my faith in him when he's constantly late." 

Ginny smiled. "Don't you have secretaries to terrorize, Draco?" she said. 

"Always," said Draco. He tossed his empty cup into the bin and opened the door for her. Ginny turned to thank him, but he cut in, "No. Thank you, Ginevra." She stood on tiptoe to give him a peck on the cheek. 

When Ginny returned to her desk, she balled up the napkin with thirty tallies on it and threw it away with her empty coffee cup. 

 

**Six.**

Dumbledore's funeral procession had an undercurrent of solemn pride, and Draco felt it was appropriate to what the participants needed, but not at all consistent with the man that had been Albus Dumbledore. He had the occasional urge to throw candies, especially lemon drops, at the audience. The thought made him smile. It was the first time he had smiled in days, until he saw Lucius among the crowd. 

Losing Dumbledore was difficult enough without his father's malicious presence. Draco set his chin high as he walked past the group of known Death Eaters. He pretended not to hear his father's venomous words, or to see the spit that landed on his shoe. He was practiced in ignoring his father's spite. 

It wasn't fair that even now, after he had left, his father still had the power to make him miserable. Draco knew it would be that way, but it still wasn't fair. 

Ginevra knew it, too. Draco had overheard her talking to Harry about him once, before he had dared to be anything like a friend to Harry. Some Death Eater raid or another made the front page of the Daily Prophet, with Lucius's picture taking up most of the space of the article. Draco ripped the front page off the newspaper and deposited it in the trash bin before proceeding to read the rest of it. 

"It's just...I want to see him happy. And he's not," Ginny had said. She was upset enough that she was obviously having difficulty keeping her voice down. "God, Harry, if you heard some of the things he's told me about how he grew up—" 

Harry murmured something comforting then. Draco felt his heart swell and then sink. "I want to help him," Ginny went on, clearly crying by that point. "But he won't let me. I'm sorry, there I go again. That's Mum all over me." She laughed nervously and wiped her eyes. 

It was a strange mixture of hope and hurt, knowing that someone cared that much about him. Draco had no idea what Harry had to say about all of it, until the funeral procession. 

Seeing his father brought back all sorts of unpleasant memories for Draco, but then came the feeling of having the eyes of every Auror and Ministry official—people he had worked with and said good morning and good evening to for months by then—immediately scrutinizing him. It was enough to make him feel physically ill. When they passed the Ministry building, he slipped inside to one of the bathrooms and leaned heavily against one of the sinks, pressing his forehead against the cold mirror, unsure if his body wanted to sob or vomit more. Draco's pride refused to do either, and he stood there, clammy hand on his face, willing his body to calm itself. 

"I don't care. I don't care. I don't care." He was trying to figure out if he was encouraging his apathy toward Dumbledore, Lucius, or both when he opened his eyes to find Harry Potter standing in the doorway, watching him. His schoolboy instincts took over and twenty different insults leaped to Draco's tongue, but none made their escape. Instead he stared back at Potter's reflection, not bothering to hide the fact that he looked and felt a wreck. 

Potter wore the same flat expression as when he had received the owl telling of Dumbledore's demise. Despite his blank countenance, however, Draco could see that Potter was coiled tight as a spring, the tension in his shoulders plain. He looked like a man who was merely delaying an inevitable explosion, and Draco was not sure if he wanted to be present to witness it. 

Potter left after a moment without a word. Draco guessed he had seen enough. 

 

 **Seven.**

"I told you Muggle food wasn't going to kill you," said Harry in the lift. "There was no need to look so paranoid in that noodle bar. It's not like the stuff was going to leap out of the pans and attack you." 

Draco sniffed at one of the waxy white take-out boxes piled in his arms. "Reminds me of one of Longbottom's flobberworm debacles in Potions," he observed. Harry laughed. The lift door opened. 

"You take Ginny's and I'll drop the rest off on Arthur's end," he said. He made the rounds, handing food out to the personnel and chatting with some. It took Harry a while to explain the use of chopsticks to Arthur Weasley, who was more interested in the poorly-translated instructions on the wrapper than in learning how to eat with them. In the end, he left the task in the hands of Kingsley Shacklebolt. 

By the time Harry made it back to the Auror offices, Draco was nowhere in sight, his lunch forgotten on his desk. Ginny flagged him down with her chopsticks and pointed to the employee lounge. 

"Narcissa Malfoy's here." Harry's eyes narrowed. "She's talking to Draco. I don't expect it's going well." 

"How long have they been in there?" 

"They just went in," said Ginny. Harry turned to peer through the blinds, but he couldn't make anything out. "Damn," he muttered, "it's bad enough they threw him out, but do they have to come rub his nose in it?" 

"Threw him out?" Ginny looked genuinely surprised. 

"Lucius bloody well threw him out," said Harry. "I would have thought he told you that. The two of you are thick as thieves." 

Ginny shook her head slowly. "Lucius didn't throw him out, Harry. He left of his own accord." 

"What?" 

"He told me," Ginny continued, "that he left. He was really disappointed when the Ministry stopped using him as a spy. He felt it was a waste of his talents. So when he interviewed for his desk job, he thought if he said Lucius threw him out, it would better his chances of working as a spy again. He wouldn't tell me why he left, of course, but he did say that much. I'm surprised he didn't tell you." 

"I'm sure he had his reasons. Ever a Slytherin, aren't we?" mused Harry, still trying to see into the conference room. 

"It's awfully quiet in there. I'd be less worried if Draco would just yell at her." Ginny did look concerned. Harry couldn't blame her, not with wild fears of kidnapping or murder creeping into his brain. 

"I wish we could hear what they're saying," he muttered. 

"I know," said Ginny. Then she clapped a hand to her forehead. "Oh, I'm an idiot!" She opened a drawer in her desk and pulled out a long piece of flesh-colored string. "Here," she said, handing the Extendable Ear to Harry. He stuck one end in his ear and watched the other creep along the floor until it had slipped under the staff lounge door. 

Draco's voice was the first thing he heard, and he sounded none too happy. "You're wasting your time," he said. 

"Draco," said Narcissa in a measured tone, "your father's will has to be read with the beneficiaries present." 

"And?" 

"You need to be there to sign the papers. The settlement is on Sunday." 

Narcissa's claim gave Harry pause, and he knew it must have thrown Draco slightly because it was a moment before his reply came. "He didn't have me written out?" 

"Until the day he died, your father entertained hopes of your returning to us, as did I," Narcissa said. "But when you didn't stay for your own father's funeral, I was forced to reconsider." 

There was a loud noise, as of something being slammed on the conference room table. Draco's response was cold and final. "I don't want it. Any of it," he said. Harry noted uneasily that Draco was fast approaching being the angriest he had ever heard him. 

"Draco, I'm not asking you to make the same choices your father made," said Narcissa. She remained quite calm, considering the tone Draco had used with her. "Obviously some of them were questionable." 

Draco snorted. "Obviously." 

"What I meant," said Narcissa more firmly, "is that your father was far from perfect. He may not have always made the right decisions as far as your growing up is concerned..." 

"He rarely made the right decisions about anything, going by my working definition of 'right.'" 

"Lucius was human, Draco. We all are." 

Draco exploded. "If he was so damned human, why did he expect more from me? Why did I always have to be fucking perfect when he wasn't? I was never allowed the luxury of being human, and you know it." 

Draco was yelling at that point, and with a wince, Harry hastily pulled the Extendable Ear out of his own. Once glance at Ginny told him she hadn't needed an Extendable Ear to hear Draco's last outburst. If the look on her face were any indication of the look on his own, Harry knew he must appear beyond alarmed. 

"Did you leave the case file on Dolohov in there?" Ginny asked suddenly. 

Harry looked at her blankly for a moment. "I did," he said. Then, as Ginny's implication dawned on him, "I _did_. I suppose I should fetch it, shouldn't I?" 

Ginny nodded once, decidedly. "I suppose you should." Harry flashed her a quick grin before steeling himself, knocking loudly three times, and entering the staff room. 

The atmosphere was thick at best. Draco was leaning heavily on the table, glaring at Narcissa with a fury that surprised even Harry, who was no stranger to anger. Upon seeing Harry enter the room, Draco relaxed minutely. 

"Pardon," said Harry, clearing his throat. "Mrs. Malfoy." 

Narcissa inclined her head. "Mr. Potter." 

"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I just needed to check on something. Draco?" He cast Draco a questioning look. 

Realizing the thing Harry was checking on was him, Draco said quietly, "It's fine." Harry nodded, grabbed the file off the table, and left the room.  
Several minutes later, Draco escorted Narcissa out of the staff room. He wore an expression of resigned stiffness. Harry watched from his perch on Ginny's desk as Draco walked his mother to the lift and watched as the door closed behind her, his shoulders sagging somewhat. 

"I'm going home tomorrow," he said dully. 

"I've never heard anyone so unhappy to hear they've not been disowned," said Ginny around a mouthful of noodles. Draco turned, quizzical. Harry held up the piece of flesh-colored string. 

"Didn't your parents ever tell you not to eavesdrop?" Draco growled without much animosity. 

"Obviously not, if my brothers invented these things," Ginny pointed out. Harry simply shrugged, an explanation from his end being unnecessary. Draco muttered something about the negative influence of Muggles on manners and dug the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. 

"Hell, I don't want to do this," he said. 

"Then don't," said Harry. 

"It's not that simple," Draco sighed. "You know what a collection of Dark Arts paraphernalia my father had. The Manor is practically a museum." 

"And you stand to inherit all of it?" Harry let out a low whistle. 

"Though I'm not keen to have all that shit in my flat, it's probably better than letting it fall into the wrong hands." 

Ginny nodded. "There might be some really useful stuff in there." 

"All the same, I think I'd rather let a hippogriff gnaw my legs off than go back to that place," said Draco grimly. 

"Then take someone with you," said Ginny suddenly. "It might not be so bad if you're not alone." 

Draco shook his head. "No." 

"Harry wouldn't mind going. Would you, Harry?" 

"Absolutely not," said Draco. He shot Ginny another withering glare and added, "It's too dangerous. My father's associates will all be there, of course. It would be like handing them Wonder Boy here on a platter." 

"Surely they wouldn't attack him at the reading of your father's will," Ginny insisted, "they must have better manners than that." 

Draco snorted and was about to reply when Harry cleared his throat loudly. 

"Surely," Harry repeated, "I would get a say in this matter." 

Draco pointed a slim, triumphant finger at Ginny. "See, he knows better than to come along. He's smarter than he looks." 

"He didn't say he wasn't going," said Ginny. 

"He didn't say he was," said Draco around clenched teeth. 

"I'm going," said Harry. Ginny and Draco fell silent. Harry noted that Draco was glaring at Ginny for some reason, in response to which Ginny shrugged minutely. "Now, if the two of you are finished talking about me as if I'm not here, I'll be getting back to work." He stalked back to his desk, pleased that he left silence in his wake. Looking back at Ginny's desk, he saw the Draco had collapsed in Ginny's chair and was massaging his temples with a pained expression. Ginny merely looked smug. 

Harry wondered, and not for the first time, what it all was about.

* * *

He Apparated to Draco's flat before the sun rose. As he suspected, Draco was already dressed and preparing to leave without him.

"Morning, sunshine," Harry called in the direction of the rattling in the kitchen. Draco stuck his head around the doorway and glared at him. 

"Don't you knock?" he asked, voice still gravelly from sleep. 

"Not when you're planning on leaving without me, no," said Harry. Draco rolled his eyes and disappeared into the kitchen again. 

"Here," he called, and a cup of coffee levitated itself around the doorway and hovered in front of Harry. He plucked it from the air and set it on a nearby endtable. 

"Thanks," he said. Draco came back into the room in time to find him hanging a cigarette from his lips. "Mind?" Harry asked. 

"No, no. Make yourself at home," Draco drawled. The cigarette lit itself and Harry took it out of his mouth only long enough to throw back the cup of coffee. 

"Don't do that," said Draco out of reflex when Harry used wandless magic. 

Harry mumbled an apology and conjured a second cup of coffee, which he promptly drained. Draco watched him, running a hand through his hair.  
"Look, Harry," he said, obviously searching for words, "if you don't want to do this, you don't have to. I certainly won't force you to go somewhere I don't want to go, myself." 

Harry smiled slightly. "I want to." He couldn't place Draco's expression at these words. 

"I can't imagine why," Draco said after a long moment, "but I won't argue with you. Let's get this over with." Harry rubbed out his cigarette in the coffee cup and nodded in agreement. 

They Apparated to the front gates of Malfoy Manor, as Draco claimed he wasn't about to Floo there when he didn't know what the situation was like. The place was not what Harry expected. Years of assuming Draco Malfoy grew up in grey, morbid-looking castle filled with bloodthirsty ghosts and booby-traps were proved wrong when a pleasant stone mansion came into view. It was surrounded by woods with a family cemetery on one side and perfectly manicured gardens in the front. The place had an unexpected beauty in the early morning light. 

"This is where you grew up?" Harry asked. 

"Unfortunately," said Draco. "Don't touch the gate, it'll hex you." Harry stood back and let Draco work the countercurse. Perhaps the booby-trap assumption wasn't that far off, Harry noted as they walked through the gardens. Trees and shrubs were trimmed into the shapes of animals even Hagrid might hesitate to love, and Harry wondered if those pretty flowers might be as venomous as he suspected they were. 

The front door opened before they even got near it. Narcissa Malfoy watched them approach. Draco's hand had curled into a fist. Harry let him ascend the front steps before him, reassuring him with a slight touch on the shoulder that did not go unnoticed by Narcissa as she let them in. 

"Answering the door yourself, Mother? Where have all the house elves gone?" Draco asked, removing his coat. 

"The few I have kept are all busy with the other guests," said Narcissa. "I wanted to greet you personally." Her eyes flickered from her son to Harry. 

"Mother, you remember Harry," said Draco stiffly. 

If the house itself was a surprise to Harry, Narcissa Malfoy was an even greater shock. He expected nothing but malice from the woman whose husband he had killed. There was none of that in Narcissa's voice as she nodded to him and said, "Mr. Potter, yes. I want to thank you," 

"For what?" Harry asked, surprised. 

"For coming here with Draco," Narcissa said. Harry glanced around suspiciously, to which she added, "No, no. I promise no harm will come to you on my account. I wanted to thank you for coming with him because I don't think he would have come alone." 

Draco confirmed her observation with a snort. Narcissa turned to him and said more seriously, "Draco, you might keep an eye on him. I promise not to harm him, but the others have made no such concession." Draco's eyes narrowed slightly and he stalked off into a room on the left for the reading of the will. Harry moved to follow him, but Narcissa caught his arm. 

"And you might do the same for him," she said quietly. Harry looked at her quizzically but nodded. Thus far, Malfoy Manor and its inhabitants seemed to follow a theme of exterior pleasantry, though Harry still had his suspicions that it masked something that would just as soon hex him as look at him. He followed Draco into the other room, casting an occasional glance behind him. 

What little hospitality Narcissa had shown them withered and died upon entering the drawing room. An ancient wizard in black judiciary robes was seated behind a massive ornately carved desk, scrutinizing a stack of parchments. His were the only eyes that did not turn to glare at Harry and Draco as they entered. There were several other people seated in the room, mostly family friends and distant relatives, and nearly all supporters of Voldemort. Draco did what he always did when confronted with an unnerving situation: he lifted his chin even higher and cemented the sneer on his face, determined to convince everyone present that he had the upper hand. Knowing Draco did this out of nerves, it merely pointed out to Harry how miserable his friend was. He followed Draco to find a seat in one of the chairs set up near the desk. 

Once Narcissa seated herself on the other side of Draco, the proceedings began. For the most part, it consisted of the wizard behind the desk reading aloud from Lucius's will, followed by whispered comments from the others present. A few select items went to Narcissa and the other friends and family, but Draco inherited the majority of his father's holdings, as expected. Harry would have found the whole thing rather tedious had he not been so preoccupied with keeping a watchful eye on everyone in the room. 

After the reading was finished, the house elves brought out trays of hors d'oeuvres and tea. The visitors sipped and mingled, and it was all very polite, except for the occasional comment Harry overheard concerning Draco and his working at the Ministry. 

"Really, how could Lucius allow that? Letting him walk out like he did. Unthinkable." 

"And keeping him in the will even after it was obvious Draco was working for Dumbledore!" 

"He just wasn't cut out for it, I suppose. They spoiled him, that's the problem. He couldn't cut it in his father's shoes." 

"It's a wonder someone hasn't killed him yet. Not that he'd be missed." 

Knuckles white, Harry did his best to rein in his temper. He bit his lip until he was certain he tasted blood, but he didn't want to release his death-grip on his chair to check. He breathed deeply and tried to tune out the spiteful insults masked by politeness. Goddamn, but he needed a cigarette. He didn't know how Draco did it, shoving his anger and hurt down so far beneath the surface that it was nearly undetectable. 

It was then that Harry saw it—one of the visitors, whose face Harry recognized from the endless files at the Ministry, was drawing his wand out of his voluminous sleeve. Draco had his back to the man, directing a house elf to bring him coffee instead of tea. Harry watched, eyes narrowed, as the man said something snide to his friend, turned, and motioned to wave his wand in Draco's direction. 

Harry lost the tenuous hold he had on his temper. 

The man's wand flew out of his hand with startling speed and impaled itself in the wall across the room, small chunks of plaster scattering beneath it. Draco dropped his teacup and ducked. The man looked around the room wildly, clearly confused as to what had just happened. So was everyone else, as no one appeared to be holding a wand and no incantation had been heard. 

Draco's eyes snapped from the wand, still quivering from its impact with the wall right over his head, to Harry. Harry was on his feet and seething, watching the crowd as several wands had been drawn warily. 

The inkwell on the desk exploded, ink running down its leg and onto the rug, followed by one of the lamps by the door going up in a shower of sparks. A jagged crack spidered its way across one window. Draco cursed and drew Narcissa aside, whispering something quickly. She nodded. Draco made a mad dash for Harry, grabbing him by the arm and dragging him bodily from the room. He didn't stop until they reached the cemetery, where he placed both hands on Harry's shoulders and shook him. Harry swatted him away. 

"Fucking hell," he said, gripping his head as if it were about to fall apart in halves. A steady stream of obscenities issued from his mouth. Draco watched him for a moment before pulling out his wand and murmuring a spell to ease his headache. Harry relaxed visibly and sat on one of the tombstones. "I'm sorry. I knew that was going to happen." 

Draco sat down next to him. "For God's sake, Harry, don't be sorry. It's not your fault my family's homicidal. I should have known this might happen, considering the last time you were around Death Eaters en masse, you turned them into a fine red mist for what they did to Dumbledore." Harry suspected Draco was just glad to get out of the situation minus an inkwell, a lamp, and a window. 

"It was worth it, though," Draco added, a laugh bubbling up. "The looks on their faces when they couldn't figure out what was going on."

He kept laughing, and after a moment, Harry joined him, relief easing the pit of nervousness in his gut. He'd been so worried that he'd angered Draco, or alienated him just when they had found an easy truce after all those years of sniping at one another. Without stopping to think, Harry reached out and, fingers lingering on Draco's chin, kissed him.

When the other man didn't respond, Harry pulled away and dropped his hand. The look on Draco's face was one of pure shock. Harry felt his face heat with embarassment. "I'm sorry," he said again. "I shouldn't have done that. Forget it ever happened."

"Like hell," said Draco fervently, and suddenly Harry was being kissed as if Draco's life depended on it. He brought his hand back up to cradle Draco's skull, slowing him down until they were engaged in a leisurely exploration of each other's mouths. Draco finally pulled away for breath, still regarding Harry with disbelief.

"So." Harry said after a moment. "That happened."

"Yeah," Draco agreed. "Is it going to happen again?"

"I hope so," said Harry. He ran his thumb across Draco's mouth, where his stubble had reddened the skin there. "God, you are incredible." Draco laughed sheepishly, but Harry kept him from looking away and dodging the compliment. "No, I mean it, Draco. You are."

"Enough to inspire an epic magical tantrum," Draco joked. "They'll be talking about that at the family reunions for years to come." Harry turned away, and Draco fell quiet. "What is it? I told you it didn't matter," he said, confusion creeping into his voice.

Harry fumbled for words. "That isn't the worst of it," he began. "What happened in Little Hangleton didn't happen because they killed Dumbledore." 

Draco's eyebrows shot up. "What?" 

Harry took a deep, shaky breath. His head still hurt, though it was nowhere near as painful as it had been after his magical tantrum, as Draco put it. Draco's spell helped. So did the kissing. "That was part of it, of course, but...what set me off was seeing them at the procession. And how they treated you." Draco watched him, expression unreadable, and made no response. Harry went on, "You're one of the toughest people I've ever known, and to watch them break you down like that, I just...well, you know."

Draco kissed him again, hard. When Harry responded in kind, Draco let loose a tiny exhalation of breath somewhere between a gasp and a sob before clinging to Harry like a lifeline. Harry wasn't prepared to feel Draco—the boy from school with whom Harry had always associated cold, unforgiving things—he wasn't prepared to feel him melt in his hands. It felt like Draco was coming apart at the seams, and in an attempt to hold him together Harry let his hands roam all over the body pressed against his.  
They parted for breath and Harry's hand found Draco's jaw again, mapping the angle of it. 

Draco sighed and leaned into the touch. "Most people who are courting bring flowers," he said. "I pick someone who commits mass murder as a token of affection."

Harry choked out a laugh. "Courting," he repeated, shaking his head. "Who says that anymore?"

"So you're not denying it?"

"No," said Harry thoughtfully, "I might not have known what I was doing at the time, but no, I'm not denying it."

"I'm glad you finally came around," Draco said after a moment. "Because I've been holding out hope for what feels like forever now. And the only reason I'm telling you this at all is because Ginevra knows, and I made her promise not to tell you, so of course she's fit to burst." 

"Lucius didn't kick you out, did he?" said Harry, breath hot against Draco's cheek. 

Draco shook his head minutely. "I left," he said. 

"Why?" 

"God, Harry, isn't that much obvious?" Draco was seated on the very edge of the tombstone, pressed against Harry with his legs on either side of Harry's waist. Something in Harry's throat tightened at Draco's words. 

"I'm so sorry," he said against Draco's neck. His voice broke. Draco hushed him and ran a hand through his hair. "That night outside the pub, after Dumbledore died?" 

"Mmm?" said Draco. 

"I wanted to kiss you. Very, very much." 

"Why on earth didn't you?" Draco pressed his lips against Harry's ear. He shivered even in the early afternoon sun. 

"I was afraid you might think it was...unrefined." Draco laughed, but Harry pulled away. "Well, look at me. I'm a mess. I smoke. I drink too much. I've got an evil mastermind and his minions chasing after me. I've a horrible temper and I make things explode when I get angry." 

"So what?" said Draco. His lips trailed down to the curve of Harry's neck. 

"Exploding. Not refined," Harry murmured, arching into Draco's touch. 

"And what if I said I didn't care? That I'd kill you if you changed one bit?"  
Harry made no response other than to duck his head and catch Draco's mouth once more. When his hands reached to untuck Draco's shirt and brushed skin, Draco pulled away long enough to murmur that they really should go somewhere other than the family graveyard to continue. Harry grudgingly agreed, and they Apparated to Draco's flat. 

They left a trail of clothing leading from the sitting room to the bedroom. Somewhere in the back of his mind Harry found it amusing—like leaving breadcrumbs to find his way out—but he was too occupied with the man currently tugging him down onto the mattress to focus on anything other than the arms pulling him close and the lips working at the tender spot where neck joined shoulder. 

It had grown darker as the afternoon wore on, and Harry found himself distracted by the fact that he could hardly make out Draco's features in the dim. Tracing a path along the pale chest with his tongue, Harry paused momentarily until the candles on the bedside table flared to life. 

Draco's fingers tightened in Harry's hair where he had been cradling the back of his skull. "Don't—don't do that," he said out of reflex, though the scolding was made weak by the gasp Harry elicited by raking his teeth across a nipple. 

"Don't do what?" Harry chuckled, pausing in his ministrations. Draco growled and gripped Harry's shoulder hard with his free hand, leaving momentary white streaks on the tanned skin. 

"Not that," he said impatiently, "you can keep doing that." And Harry did.

* * *

Because the reading of the will had been on Friday, their first contact with Ginny was three days later at the Ministry. This was not for lack of trying on Ginny's part, though the fact that she had limited her inquiries to a mere two owls and three phone messages between the two of them was a little surprising. Not that Draco and Harry weren't appreciative of her part in their getting together, but it was just so easy to string her along a bit.

At work, they avoided direct questions and answered others with a shrug and a smile. Yes, the reading was awful. No, no one was harmed in the process. The only casualties had been inanimate objects. 

When Ginny asked if Harry was still up for their usual evening out, Harry glanced at Draco and tried not to smile at him. "Of course, Gin. Want to eat in this time? My treat," he said. 

Ginny eyed him suspiciously. "Sure," she said. 

Harry knew he and Draco were doing a thorough job of ignoring one another, and that Ginny's interrogation was not going as she had hoped it would. Ginny was close to going spare over the whole thing. 

So when Ginny appeared at Harry's flat that evening and heard laughter coming from the kitchen, she picked her way over the piles of Dark Arts books Draco had begun to amass from his father's library and stood in the doorway to watch Harry and Draco arguing over how rare the meat should be. She set the bottle of wine she had brought on the table with a loud thump. 

"You're bastards, the both of you," she said with a grin. She ran up to them, gathering them both in an enormous hug despite the fact that Harry had potholders on. 

She didn't stay for dessert. Harry had a feeling she knew better as he felt Draco's hand reach for his own under the table.


End file.
